


Firewood

by purple_cube



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: F/M, Threats of Rape/Non-Con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-28
Updated: 2014-03-28
Packaged: 2018-01-17 09:24:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1382341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purple_cube/pseuds/purple_cube
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sixteen year old Johanna Mason that was reaped for the Games is dead. But twenty-one year old Johanna Mason is only just learning how to live.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Firewood

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning for mentions of non-con (no more graphic than canonical descriptions).

 

On the day of the reaping, she stands alongside strangers. She has friends, people that she likes and even loves, but they made a pact that they wouldn’t stand shoulder to shoulder, wouldn’t give the Capitol the satisfaction of seeing each other crumble if their names were called. So she surrounds herself with people whose names she doesn’t know, people who display only expressions of relief when it’s her name that is voiced.

_Johanna Mason._

As heads turn and the camera moves to focus on her, she makes a promise to herself, right then and there.

_I will never give them what they want._

Her parents are already crying when they are ushered in to see her. The sight of them only hardens her resolve. But then, her five year old brother clings to her leg and begs her not to leave him.

And she crumbles, for the first – and she hopes, only – time.

“It’s okay, kiddo,” she whispers through the tears. “I think I’ve got time to tell you your bedtime story early. Just for today.”

~

Her mentor takes one look at her and declares that she’s as good as dead. She’s too weedy, too weak, too pathetic. She hasn’t even opened her mouth.

Her fellow tribute from Seven laughs and tells their former Victor that he’d better concentrate his efforts on him instead. So he does, and she’s pretty much left to her own devices.

_Well, that’s fine by me._

She doesn’t speak to anyone at the Training Centre. She drifts from station to station, showing competence at most things but excelling at nothing. She flings a few axes around for the Gamemakers, with enough success to guarantee that her weapon of choice will be waiting for her at the Cornucopia, but only earning a score of eight and deflecting any interest from other tributes.

She enter the arena with a plan that is entirely her own.

And she leaves with it, and herself, intact.

But she soon discovers that just because she tells herself that the Capitol can’t have certain things from her, it doesn’t mean that they won’t take it anyway.

~

“You showed that you have a ruthless streak,” Snow comments over the rim of his tea cup, his eyes never leaving hers. “There are many in the Capitol that would pay the highest price for that sort of thing.”

Her mind adds the words _in the bedroom_ even if he doesn’t.

She scoffs. “Not interested. I took part in your pathetic Games, I took lives for you. Now, I get to be left alone.”

It’s his turn to scoff, and he gives her that same look of disdain that her mentor had just two weeks ago. _Had it really only been two weeks?_

“Miss Mason,” he continues with a wry smile, “Whatever made you think that being _left alone_ would be part of the deal? Did your mentor not prepare you adequately for life as a Victor?”

Her mentor’s been too busy trying to take the credit for her win – at the same time as trying to keep her as far as possible from any weapon that she would deem suitable for hurling at his head.

The President sets his cup down onto the saucer that rests on the table. Quietly, and far too fluidly for a man of his age, he rises. “I suggest you become acquainted with some of the previous Victors and discover what will be expected of you. As well as what will not be tolerated.”

~

She goes to Finnick Odair – not to ask what will happen to her, but why he lets it happen to him.

His face drops immediately, and it’s only then that she realizes that she’s only ever seen the mask that he wears for the Capitol. She has never seen the man beneath, not until now. He looks so…vulnerable.

“I was fourteen years old when I won. Do you have any idea how much they were willing to pay for a fourteen year old virgin?”

“So, you’re in it for the money?” she asks, not bothering to hide the contempt in her voice.

He shakes his head, looking at her like he’s praying for her get his point, to understand, before he has to say something he’ll regret. “That money never came to me. And even if it did, it would never be about the money.”

She waits impatiently for him to continue, knowing that she shouldn’t push him.

“I have parents, Johanna,” he says in a voice that smacks of desperation. “Two younger sisters, aunts and uncles and cousins. There are four entire families that the Gamemakers interviewed during my time in the arena. Snow threatened every single one of them, right down to my pregnant cousin.”

“He wouldn’t have gone through with it,” she argues. “If your entire family vanished, do you really think the people of the Capitol would just sit back and ignore it? One word from you and there would be protests on the streets.”

His lips purse into a bitter smile. “Like there were for Haymitch Abernathy?”

She has to think for a moment to locate a face for the name. “The drunk from Twelve?”

He nods.

She tries to recall a time when she hasn’t seen him drunk, when she has seen anything other than vacancy in his expression. She doesn’t have an answer and remains quiet for a minute, several in fact, until he gets up to gaze out of the window.

“I don’t believe you,” she whispers, wishing so hard for him to think she means it.

The last thing she hears as she walks out is a quiet plea. “Watch your back, Johanna.”

~

In the end, it’s Flickerman, of all people, that asks the question. Live on air, too.

“So, Johanna,” he whispers, as if it’s some great conspiracy. “When will we be seeing you again in the Capitol? Soon, we hope?”

She laughs with a sense of glee that couldn’t be further from the truth. “Oh, Caesar. I _cannot_ wait to come back to see all you wonderful people.” She waits for the applause, and Flickerman gives her a short nod of encouragement. “But, I need to show my appreciation to my District, to my friends and of course, my family. Without them, I wouldn’t be here.”

“One, maybe two weeks?” he asks.

“Two weeks at the most,” she promises.

The crowd cheers again.

~

Four people die in the logging accident, crushed to death under the weight of countless felled trees that should never have been freed. Four families mourn for their fathers, husbands, brothers.

She mourns with her mother and brother – until the day that she returns home to find it razed to the ground, the last of the embers dying out under the gaze of the afternoon sun. Somewhere in those ashes, lie the remains of her family.

Hands are placed gently on her shoulders to move her, take her into somebody else’s home to care and bathe and feed her. Other hands put her on a train to the Capitol.

She doesn’t see Snow for an entire month. When he finally appears, four bodies quickly place themselves between them, as if they know how she will react.

“You said I could have two weeks. You promised!” she screams, strong arms closing around from behind her like a vise as she tries to reach him.

His lips twitch, but he doesn’t smile when answers. “ _I_ didn’t promise you anything.”

~

She goes to Finnick again.

“I didn’t know where else to go.”

He lets her into his apartment without a word. He makes her tea, which is ridiculous because it’s all anyone’s been willing to give her since _they_ died. She starts to ask him if he’s got anything stronger, but the sound of her voice is drowned out by the chattering of her cup against its saucer.

Finnick takes both items from her shaking hands, placing them on the table before pulling her gently toward him. His forehead rests against hers, his deep, slow breathing encouraging her to follow suit. She tries her best.

“I don’t need a pity fuck,” she whispers after a minute.

“Ever think that I might need one?”

She starts to laugh, but the sound dies in her throat when she sees his expression.

“Yep,” he says lightly. “That’s pity, all right.”

They go slow, uneasy at times, painfully desperate at others. It is what is, and she thinks that it helps them both to forget, if only for a moment.

After, she tells him that she’s sorry.

He is sprawled on his chest, and she watches his bare back rise and fall rhythmically. “Was I that bad?” he asks lazily.

“No,” she replies. “I just wish things were different. For both of us.”

“They could be, one day.”

“Do you really believe that?” The question comes out softer than she expects, more hopeful than suspicious.

“I have to,” he replies, his eyes bright when they meet hers.

~

The Capitol quickly loses interest in her when she refuses to yield to their requests for pleasantries and frivolities. She hears the excuses that they give on her behalf – grief, fatigue, stress. She is yanked away from the spotlight almost as quickly as she was thrust into it, her mentor taking her place on the Victory Tour.

She isn’t granted such sympathy when it comes to the next Games, unfortunately.

The fresh tributes are merchants, civilized carpenters, like her partner the previous year had been. They look at her with such contempt – being a Victor doesn’t trump growing up amongst the lumberjacks, it seems – so she walks out and never sees them again.

Rinse and repeat – until the fucking Quarter Quell.

~

She screams at anyone who’s willing to hear – and plenty that aren’t. _This wasn’t part of the fucking deal._

Haymitch catches up with her the night before the Quell. The Mockingjay and her pretend lover have made the rooftop their own, but they have yet to discover her retreat: the balcony that lies on the floor below.

The sharp clink of a bottle against the doorway interrupts her peace, and she knows who it is without bothering to turn around.

“Come to offer your condolences, District Twelve? You know, you’re one lucky son-of-a-bitch, having that lovesick puppy volunteer for you.”

His tread is steadier than she expects, as is his almost graceful drop to a seated position beside her. She turns to take him in. He’s sober, more sober than she’s ever seen.

“What’s your game?” she asks with suspicion.

He smiles, his eyes clear and bright and possessing something she can’t quite place.

“We’re gonna start a revolution, Johanna,” he says evenly.

 _Maybe he’s not that sober, after all._ “Yeah? You and who’s army?”

“District Thirteen’s.”

Well, that gets her attention.

She listens to him, to everything, without interrupting. He doesn’t give any names, but she knows that he must have at least one Gamemaker on his side to seriously believe he can pull off this plan.

When he finishes, she’s silent for so long that he starts to doze off. She places her hand gently on his knee, and he jerks upright and alert.

“What do you need me to do?”

~

The Girl on Fire rubs her the wrong way, and Johanna has a bucketful of reasons why, should anyone ask. But there is one that she will keep to herself. It’s because she can see Katniss’s future taking only one of two roads – Johanna’s, or Finnick’s. And either way, it will break her.

Perhaps the thing that she hates most is that she sees a little of the old her in the younger girl. _The part of me that died in that fire._

Maybe that’s why she agrees to it, why she delivers Nuts and Volts to her. Why she improvises when Brutus attacks and the rebel plan gets shot to Hell.

And maybe that’s why she spends her days in the Capitol’s cell focusing on hating Katniss. Maybe if she had paid more attention to what they were doing to Peeta, instead of trying to block out his screams, she would have held her tongue and not voiced every thought that came to her mind. Because by the end, his hatred for the Mockingjay far outweighs hers.

~

They try different techniques at the beginning, but they soon realize that water that is most effective. Still, they keep themselves amused by varying the source – a simple bucket one day, a hose the next. After a few weeks, they get bored, wheel in a tank and position a shower head directly above the table that she’s been strapped to.

Each time, she can’t stop her brow from creasing, or her arms from tensing under the restraints. Her throat dries up so much that she has to swallow, and they laugh heartily as they watch her eyes bulge in fear as she looks up at the shower.

The jolt of electricity takes her back to the arena, every time. Sometimes, that’s where she stays, trapped by lightning and fire and a hovercraft that appears out of nowhere. Other times, she floats back to Seven, to home, and watches her family die over and over again.

~

The Mockingjay grows on her, and Johanna lets her, because she’s tired of hating her. Besides, Peeta hates her enough for the both of them, and even the morphling can’t hide the fact that it’s killing Katniss.

And then the Mockingjay saves her, gives her something to get up for in the morning, because there’s no way Johanna’s going to let her take the kill shot, not when she’s been dreaming of doing it herself for so many years.

~

They flood the street, and she feel herself sliding off the ladder that she’s worked so hard to climb.

In the end, she has to trust Katniss to do the job.

“Kill Snow for me.”

~

She ends up having to wait another month for it to happen, and it occupies her mind even when Coin assembles all of the remaining Victors for one final duty. _A final Hunger Games, using the Capitol’s children?_ She thinks about her brother, who would have been old enough to be a tribute next year. _Bring it on._

She tunes in to hear the end of Annie’s sentence. “And Finnick would vote no, if he was here.”

The words tumble out of her mouth out before she can rein them in. “Well, he’s not. He was killed by Snow’s mutts.”

Annie’s wounded expression makes her feel guilty, and she imagines Finnick standing behind her, hand on her shoulder and head shaking disapprovingly. And maybe he is there, because in the next moment, Annie’s expression hardens. _Guess they didn’t break her, after all_.

She’s still looking at Annie when the Mockingjay manages to surprise her.

“I vote yes…for Prim.”

Johanna watches her carefully, but she seems serious enough. And then she watches Peeta, half-expecting him to lunge at her. But it seems that the little baker boy from District Twelve is back for good, because instead of ripping her throat out with his hands, he’s pleading with Haymitch to make his deciding vote the right one.

His words fall on deaf ears though, since Haymitch is fixated on Katniss.

“I’m with the Mockingjay.”

_Well. This is an interesting turn of events._

~

Katniss Everdeen assassinates Alma Coin, and Johanna smiles widely as she slowly comes to realize that the Mockingjay understood the state of affairs more than she ever did.

~

In the end, it’s Gale that gets her out of the Capitol. He tells her that they could do with a little help in District Two, rounding up the last of the Peacekeepers and others loyal to Snow. She tells him that it would be her pleasure.

Slowly, the workload diminishes, and it occurs to her that she’ll need to find something new to do, maybe even somewhere new to go. She was given an apartment in the same building as him, and they spend most evenings together. He is sat with her feet on his lap, absentmindedly traces curls along her shin as they watch TV. Midway through a propo, he freezes, as if he’s only just worked out what he’s been doing.

“At ease, Hawthorne. I don’t class that as foreplay. I also don’t give pity fucks,” she tells him bluntly.

“Good thing too, since I don’t need your pity.” His hand is on her leg again, but this it’s still and firm. And impossibly warm.

She meets his gaze, and he’s looking at her with that half-smile that she always knew was going to be trouble.

~

He takes a long look at her in the morning, sprawled lazily on his bed. “The bathroom’s that way if you want to freshen up.”

She starts to shake her head, but he’s already on his feet and out of the room. A moment later, he returns with a long stretch of thin, white cotton.

“You can fill the sink and use this to clean yourself.”

“She told you,” she says quietly.

“I guessed after your assessment in Thirteen,” he admits. “It’ll take some time, but there’s plenty of success stories in for overcoming these fears. Just look at Peeta,” he adds softly.

Johanna sees – and hears – enough of the baker boy in her nightmares, so she changes the subject. “What are you afraid of?”

“Fire.”

She almost laughs. She must at least make a noise, because he gives her a look as if to dare her to say anything about the Girl on Fire.

They don’t talk after that, but when she returns to the building in the evening, she finds a key to his apartment and a fresh sheet of cotton waiting on her doorstep.

~

Paylor makes good on her promise for a Republic, and Gale finally relaxes enough to unpack his bags. She asks him, just once, if he was considering returning to Twelve.

“Only if the alternative was death,“ he mutters. Looking up, he seems a little more hopeful. “The Republic’s for real, now. There’s no going back, no retribution for the rebels. This is it.”

He finally gives in to Plutarch’s pleas to put his face on TV, and becomes a spokesperson for the Centralized Government. He tells her that despite gaining relative autonomy, District Two will remain the country’s military and transportation center.

His eyes light up when he talks about the depository that they found in the Capitol, the one with books that showed maps of the world and descriptions of civilizations dead and buried. He’s heard that Beetee’s team in District Three is working on a way for hovercrafts to travel further distances, to get across the seas and see if any country other than Panem survived the Old War, waged even before the Dark Days.

It’s the word _autonomy_ that stays with her though. The following day, she walks up to the Justice Building and asks for a job.

The receptionist raises an eyebrow, but leads her into an office regardless. A minute later, the door opens to reveal a tall man dressed in clothes she doesn’t recognize from Thirteen or the Capitol. It occurs to her that he may be the first citizen of Two she’s encountered that hasn’t been trying to cling to whatever is left of Snow’s legacy.

“Miss Mason,” he greets her with a blank expression. “I understand you’re after a position here?”

She nods as she watches him lower himself into the chair behind the desk. He motions for her to take the chair opposite, so she does.

“And what makes you qualified for this position?”

Her face contorts immediately, bitterness and anger just waiting to be freed from her tongue. But she holds on to them so very tightly, until she can feel them subside. Straightening her expression, she tells him the truth, but with none of her usual weapons attached.

“I survived two Hunger Games. I mentored for three more,” she says, her voice laced with calmness that she hasn’t held for such a long time. “I was captured and tortured by the Capitol, and I was a citizen of District Thirteen as the rebellion entered its final weeks.”

She has his attention now, and he waits expectantly for her to continue. So she tells him why she is really here.

“I have seen more death and destruction than a person my age – or of any age – should. And I’m sick of it. I want to see the opposite – I want to see life, food, education, healthcare. And I want to see it being shared equally with everyone.”

For the first time, he smiles at her. It’s a soft smile, like Gale’s had been when she first arrived, and it’s the kind of smile that makes her want to give something in return. This time, she smiles back.

“Welcome to the District Two Council, Miss Mason.”

~

They never use the word _love_. It wouldn’t suit either of them – not the people that they’ve become. The people that the Games and the War have turned them into. So, she asks him to describe the toasting ceremony, and he asks about the gifting ceremony.

“It’s not really a ceremony. It’s an exchange of paper. The paper that you give should contain a piece of you. It could be words, it could be a drawing or a mosaic. Hell, I even saw pieces of dried fruit stuck to one once. Supposed to represent the first meal the couple shared together, apparently.”

He nods as if he understands, but doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the evening.

When she wakes the following day, she wears her best clothes. They’re not much, but they’re from home – from before the Games, and they make her feel like her family could be standing at her side. Maybe he sees her getting dressed, or maybe he knows instinctively, because he comes downstairs in his District Twelve best. It makes a nice change from the Thirteen and Republic clothes that she’s only ever seen him wear. It makes him look younger – even more so when he smiles softly at her.

He asks what she would like to do first. She holds out her paper.

He opens it to reveal her letter. Her words that describe the journey from the day of the reaping to this moment. She watches as he reads it carefully, his expression changing ever so subtly as he takes it all in.

Finally, he looks up and gives her a small smile. “Thank you.”

Carefully, he digs out a folded piece of paper from his pocket and hands it to her.

She runs a finger across the creases; they seem well-worn, as if he’s been unfolding and refolding this piece of paper frequently. Opening it gingerly, she sees that it is a black and white photograph – of her. She’s sleeping and judging by the length of her hair, it was taken not long after she first arrived in Two.

She gasps as she takes in the expression that the camera has captured. She is smiling. She is smiling in her sleep.

“It was rare,” he says softly. “It still is. You nearly always look like you’re in pain when you’re sleeping. But that day, you seemed happy. So I wanted to capture it, preserve it, to show to you one day. I remember thinking that if Johanna Mason can smile again, then so can I.”

So she smiles at him now, because yes, she does _seem_ happy in the photograph – but right here, right now, she is truly is.

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Burning Embers](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1563212) by [sabaceanbabe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabaceanbabe/pseuds/sabaceanbabe)




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